I wish to talk about road safety in the context of the quality of our roads. I represent, as the Minister of State knows, a rural constituency with a huge number of regional roads where the county council is expected to maintain and improve road surfaces, but it cannot do that to the level we need without a major funding increase. I will give the Minister of State some examples of roads I am talking about: the old N7, now the R445, particularly in Toomevara village; the old N8, now the R639; the Cloughjordan to Borrisokane road; the Cloughjordan to Nenagh road; and the Templemore to Johnstown road. The Portumna to Birr road, between the bridge at Portumna and the bridge in Riverstown, is entirely in my constituency and needs major enhancement works, particularly from the pike back as far as the ferry near Portumna. Other examples are the Cloughjordan to Roscrea road; the Nenagh to Ballina road through Portroe and Newtown; the Nenagh to Carrigahorig road going between Puckaun, Coolbaun and Terryglass; the Nenagh to Dolla road to Tipperary town, particularly going through Curreeney; and the Thurles to Limerick road, in particular going through Ballycahill, Milestone, Rear Cross and Kilcommon. That is a lot of regional roads and I did not even cover all of them in one rural constituency. Tipperary County Council has a huge amount of work to do. It is doing its best but with inflation it can only do so much. I am getting a lot of complaints at the moment about the Thurles to Limerick road, particularly from Rear Cross towards Newport. We need further investment in our roads in Tipperary if we are going to bring the road surfaces and structures up to the standard that is needed. After the rainfall we have seen in recent weeks and months, they are now even more damaged. Sending a team out to fix potholes only does so much. We need to deal with the structure of the roads if we are going to have safer and better ones in north Tipperary. That is what our taxpayers deserve.

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